Once More Chance (Chance #2; Rosemary Beach #8)

by Abbi Glines

  I let the hand holding the phone to my ear drop to my side, then tucked it into my jeans pocket and turned to go inside. Away from the water that had changed everything for me, that had changed the lives of all of Jace’s close friends. None of us would ever be the same again. But I knew that I couldn’t protect myself from that kind of pain. Because, like Bethy, I was just surviving now. With Harlow gone, I had no reason to smile. The pain was too much. Trying not to love her was impossible—it shattered me and brought me to my knees.

  My phone started ringing, and I quickly jerked it back out of my pocket. Every time it rang, my heart started beating with the hope that it was Harlow. Rush’s name appeared on the screen. As much as I wanted to smash my phone against the wall in frustration, he was still my only link to Harlow.

  “Yeah,” I said, closing the door and walking to my bedroom.

  “I need your help. Meet me at the club as soon as possible. I’m headed that way now.”

  I wasn’t going to the club. It was time for my nightly routine, and I didn’t want to face people. “Why? I’m exhausted.”

  Rush muttered a curse. “Get your ass to the club. Tripp showed up, and apparently Bethy was at the bar drinking too much, and now she’s yelling at him and saying all kinds of crazy shit. Blaire wanted to go, but Nate isn’t feeling that great, and he wants his momma. I told her you and I would check things out and bring Bethy back to my house.”

  Bethy and Tripp? That didn’t even make sense. Why would Bethy be yelling at Tripp? Jace had adored his cousin. Always had. There was no reason in my mind why Bethy should be mad at him. “OK. Yeah, I’ll see you in a few.”

  “Thought so,” Rush replied, then ended the call.

  No one had seen Bethy do much more than move quietly through life since Jace’s death. But she was drinking at the club? That didn’t make any sense, either. She worked there as a cart girl. Why was she drunk at the bar? Her aunt would fire her ass without blinking an eye if she found out. Not that it would stick. Blaire would get upset and ask Rush, who was on the board of directors, to do something about it. Della wouldn’t be happy, either, and seeing as how her boyfriend, Woods, owned the place—and did everything in his power to make her happy—he’d do something about it, too. But still. What the fuck was she thinking?

  I grabbed my truck keys and headed out the door to deal with Bethy.

  I could hear Bethy yelling the moment I stepped out of the truck, but I couldn’t see where it was coming from. It was too loud to be coming from inside, so someone had to have gotten Bethy to the parking lot. I closed my truck door and followed the sound. Near the staff entrance, I saw Rush holding Bethy’s arms down and talking to her. Tripp stood there, running his hands through his hair as if he wasn’t sure what the hell to do. Woods talked to him quietly, and all Tripp did was shake his head no in return.

  “Come back to the house with me. Blaire wants you there. You need her right now. You also need to sober up. Tripp didn’t do anything to you, Bethy. You’re still grieving, and he was the closest person you could find to take it out on.” Rush’s voice was gentle but demanding.

  “You don’t know shit, Rush! Youdonknowshit!” Bethy slurred, shoving at Rush’s chest. “No one knows! But he does!” she screamed, pointing a finger at Tripp. “He ruined me! He broke me. I wasn’t good enough. I was never good enough! It’s all his fault. He came back. Why did you come back, huh? Were you trying to hurt me? You fucking succeeded! You are the reason my life is hell on earth!” She was trembling now.

  “Where’s Della?” I asked, drawing everyone’s attention to me. “Bethy needs a friend. We’re just gonna upset her more like this.”

  Woods didn’t look like he wanted Della around. He had to stop protecting her as if she was about to break. She was strong and healthy. He didn’t know what fragile was. He had no idea.

  “She’s asleep. She’s been up since five this morning,” Woods said in a hard voice that meant he wasn’t calling her.

  “I need to leave. Seeing me upsets her. I thought I could talk to her, but she’s not ready. Not yet,” Tripp said. The pain in his voice was so damn obvious it hurt. He was possibly the one person who was suffering from Jace’s death as much as Bethy. Why wouldn’t she accept his help?

  “Upset? You think I’m upset? I was fuckin’ upset five years ago. Now I’m . . . lost.” She said the last word in almost a whisper. Then she crumpled to the floor and wrapped her arms around her legs as she began sobbing so hard her body shook violently.

  “We gotta do something. Blaire will know what to say. I should have sent Blaire and you. I just made everything worse,” Rush said, looking back at me. Then he turned his attention to Tripp and stared at him a moment. “You know why she hates you, don’t you?” he said in his simple, to-the-point manner.

  Tripp didn’t respond.

  “Yes! He knows!” she wailed. “He knows. But Jace never knew.”

  Bethy’s drunken ranting wasn’t making any sense to me.

  I hated watching this. I hated knowing that months after Jace’s death, Bethy was still a broken, empty soul. Stepping around Rush, I bent down to Bethy’s eye level. “I’m gonna pick you up and take you to Rush’s car. He’s gonna take you to Blaire, and you’re gonna let her take care of you. She’ll be there to listen. You can trust her. She loves you. Now, put your arm around my shoulder.”

  Her sad, red-rimmed eyes stared up at me for a few seconds before she put her arm around my neck. I braced one arm against her back and slid one arm under her legs and stood up with her.

  “Where did you park?” I asked Rush.

  “Just down there on the other side of Woods,” he replied.

  I glanced one last time at Tripp, who was watching Bethy with the same hopeless look I understood all too well. What didn’t make sense was why Tripp was looking at Bethy like he’d move heaven and earth to take her pain away. Did they really even know each other?

  Harlow

  “You doing OK, sunshine?” Major asked as he took the seat beside me on the hay bale where I had sat to watch Mase work.

  Glancing up at Major, I smiled, even though I didn’t really feel like it. “Yes, and you?” I replied because it was the polite thing to do. I wasn’t in the mood to talk to him or anyone. Not today. I had been to my weekly doctor appointment. Watching all the pregnant women and their adoring husbands in the waiting room had been hard, and it was all I could do to keep from breaking down. I missed Grant.

  “Don’t look like you’re doing good. In fact, you look like someone killed your puppy,” he said teasingly.

  I knew that Maryann and Mase hadn’t told Major anything. I trusted Major because he loved his family, and I was an extension of that family, but I hated people knowing before Grant. Until Grant knew about our child, I didn’t want anyone else knowing. “Just having one of those days,” I replied, hoping that would shut him up.

  “Huh,” he replied, then looked out at Mase, who was on one of the horses. “To hear the news tell it, you were hot and heavy with Grant Carter, Rush Finlay’s former stepbrother. But I’ve been here a couple weeks, and I haven’t seen the guy who shoved down three reporters to get you into Rush’s Range Rover and out of the public eye. You know, that clip has been played about a million times. The guy looked fierce and ready to slay dragons for you. Makes me curious about where he is now.”

  I had watched that clip, too. I had watched it over and over again. It was on YouTube, and I played it often. Not because it was the moment I left Grant but because Major was right. Grant looked determined and fierce. He had yelled at reporters and basically torn a path through them, from his front door to Rush’s car, to get to me. But the part that I couldn’t forget was the look on his face, perfectly captured by the cameras, when I had driven away. He had regretted his last words to me. The pain in his eyes had been clear, and it broke my heart and healed it all at once every time I watched the clip. He hadn’t meant what he said. He had been scared.

  “He doesn’t k
now where I am,” I admitted before I could stop myself.

  “Really? And how is that? You hiding from him, too?”

  Major was being nosy, and maybe I should have told him to mind his own business, but I didn’t do that. I wanted to talk about Grant with someone. Needed to. “We needed space. He was scared of my heart condition. He doesn’t want to lose me,” I explained vaguely.

  Major didn’t respond. Instead, he reached for a piece of hay and stuck it in his mouth. With Mase’s cowboy hat perched on his head and his worn-out jeans, Major looked like he belonged in Texas. He didn’t look like a world traveler. I knew for a fact that he could speak three different languages fluently.

  “He not trying to find you? Or call you?”

  I had to delete voice mails every week so that they didn’t fill up my in-box. I couldn’t bring myself to listen to his voice, but I also didn’t want it to become impossible for him to leave messages. “No, he calls every night. He’s been trying to find me.”

  Major pulled the hay out of his mouth and frowned at me. “Then why you sitting here looking so sad?”

  Because I missed Grant. I wanted to answer his call. I was just too scared. “I have reasons,” I replied.

  “You got reasons, huh? All right, then. I just hope those reasons are worth it,” he replied. “I don’t know if any girl could get me to leave her daily messages that go unanswered for two months. I would eventually give up and move on.”

  If Grant gave up, what would I do? I didn’t want him to give up. But I wasn’t being fair to him. I hated this. I hated having to hurt him. But if he knew, he would only be hurt more.

  “Stop flirting with my sister, and get your ass out here,” Mase called from the fence.

  Major chuckled. “He’s a little overprotective, isn’t he?”

  “You have no idea,” I said.

  Major grinned, then stood up and sauntered down to Mase as if he didn’t have a care in the world.

  Grant

  “Message fifty-nine. Almost two months. I’ve never been so empty in my life. You took my soul with you. You took my heart. I’m this empty shell who goes through the motions every day, waiting for you to call me. Waiting until you answer my calls. I never imagined a life like this, but without you, I can’t imagine life. You are my life. You were what was missing in my life. I was searching so hard for something to make me feel whole. I found that with you. You lit up my world and made everything so damn bright and exciting. But now you’re gone, and I’m in a dark place, waiting. Needing to hear you. To touch you, To—”

  BEEP

  The end of another voice mail. It was the most dreaded moment of my day. The darkness in my life was so thick it was taking over everything. I had no way to see past it anymore. This voice mail was all I had to look forward to each day, because for three seconds, Harlow’s voice was there, telling me to leave a message. I loved that voice. I loved those three seconds.

  There was a knock on the door, followed by the doorbell. I glanced down at my phone. It was after ten. No one but Rush came by anymore, and Rush had a key. I threw back my covers, reached for the discarded sweatpants on the floor, then jerked them on while I walked out of the room and toward the door.

  I kicked my work boots out of the way and ignored the mud that had started collecting where I left them every day. I just didn’t care. My kitchen wasn’t in good shape, either.

  Unlocking the door, I opened it to find Woods standing on the other side. Woods Kerrington was not someone I’d expect to stop by at ten thirty at night. He had a fiancée at home he should be snuggled up to. He rarely left Della’s side when he wasn’t working.

  “I beat Rush here. Figures. Let me in,” Woods said, stepping inside, then glancing down at the dried mud on my floor. “I understand being depressed, but get a maid,” he said, then headed for my living room.

  I had started to ask him what the hell he was doing when headlights caught my attention, and I saw Rush’s Range Rover pull in and park. What was going on?

  “You got any Corona? Or just this Bud Light shit?” Woods called out from my kitchen.

  I wasn’t even going to respond to that question. Uppity country-club owner.

  Rush climbed the steps toward me. I watched him carefully. If this was some kind of intervention, I was beating both of their asses. I needed a good fight. Some way to release the pain.

  “Relax, I’m not here to council you. Unclench your fists, and let me inside. I have something you need to hear,” Rush said as he stopped in front of me.

  “Why is Woods here?” I asked, not sure I believed him.

  Rush sighed and rubbed his chin. He was nervous. Shit. What did he need to tell me? “I just thought we might need some backup. What I’m gonna tell you isn’t something you’re gonna want to hear. But you need to know. So I have him here in case you react badly.”

  “Is Harlow OK?” I asked, grabbing his arm as he stepped into the apartment. The instant panic that swamped me gave me the most helpless feeling I’d ever had.

  “She’s fine. Let go and calm down. Let’s go in the living room,” Rush said, then shot a pointed look at my grip on his arm. I let go, and he walked past me. If Harlow was OK, I didn’t see how anything else could upset me. She was it for me. I didn’t care about anything or anyone else. Rush knew that, so his statement that Harlow was OK didn’t do much to ease my mind.

  I stalked after him and found Woods on my sofa with a beer and one leg propped up on the ottoman, watching me. His eyes swung to Rush’s, then back to me. He didn’t look like he knew what this was about, either. The curiosity in his gaze wasn’t the same concerned look in Rush’s.

  “Thanks for meeting me here,” Rush said, and Woods nodded his head.

  “No problem. It sounded important,” Woods replied.

  “Tell me what the fuck is going on,” I demanded, not willing to wait any longer. I wasn’t going to calm down, and I sure as hell wasn’t going to sit down.

  Rush turned around to look at me. “Probably should sit down,” he said.

  “No,” I barked.

  “Didn’t think so, but I thought I’d try,” he replied. He didn’t move to sit down, either. “Mase called me about two hours ago,” he began, then ran his hand through his hair, which was a nervous habit of his.

  “Is she with Mase now?” I asked, scanning the room for where I’d left my keys when I got home from work earlier. If she was in Texas, I would get on the next flight out.

  “Grant. No. Stop. Listen to me,” Rush said in a sharp tone.

  I swung my gaze back to his. “If she is in Texas, I’m going to motherfucking Texas! You can’t stop me. The cops can’t stop me. No one CAN. FUCKING. STOP. ME!” I roared.

  “You need to listen to what I have to say first. It’s important.” Rush’s tone had turned commanding. Thing was, I didn’t give a rat’s ass. I was going to see Harlow.

  “She can tell me what’s going on. I’m going to Texas,” I told him with enough determination that he knew I was serious. I had to get to her.

  “There are things you need to know,” he said, raising his voice over mine.

  “All I need to know is where she is. That’s all I need to fucking know!” I snarled. He was wasting my time. I had to get my keys and get out of here.

  “Oh, for Christ’s sake! I didn’t want to just come out and lay this on you, but you’re so fucking stubborn!” he yelled as I turned away from him. “She’s pregnant. Harlow is pregnant, and she won’t get an abortion, and giving birth could . . .”

  He didn’t finish. He didn’t have to. I knew what the rest of that sentence was. My knees gave way, and I grabbed the back of the chair in front of me while sheer terror squeezed my lungs and heart until I couldn’t take a breath.

  Harlow couldn’t be pregnant. She couldn’t be. Oh, God, no. I couldn’t lose her. I needed her to live. Even if she wouldn’t talk to me, I needed her alive on this earth.

  “Mase is worried. She’s determined to have this chil
d. Mase said she refuses to tell you because she knows you won’t agree with her. You’ll want her to get an abortion. She’s unwilling to even consider it.”

  “No. She can’t do this. I can’t lose her,” I said, shaking my head, refusing to accept this. I had to get to Texas. I grabbed my keys and headed for the door.

  “Where are you going?” Rush called out.

  “Texas.”

  “I didn’t say she was there. I said I’d talked to Mase,” Rush said as he came after me.

  “Then where is she? I won’t lose her. She can’t do this.” I was yelling so loudly that Rush couldn’t help wincing.

  “You need a plan,” Rush said, grabbing my arm in a firm grip. “Mase told me more. If you’ll sit and calm your ass down, I can tell you everything. Being prepared is the only way you can get through to her.”

  He was right. I hated waiting. I hated not being able to get to her, but he was right. I had to be levelheaded. If I was going to save her, I had to be ready when I saw her. Going after her in a wild panic wasn’t going to do anything but send her running to a new hiding place.

  “Does she feel OK? Did he say if she was healthy? Is she sick?” I asked.

  “She’s fine. Mase is keeping her close. Other than missing you, she’s doing OK.”

  She missed me? All she had to do was call me. I’d be there. But then, why would she trust me? After what I’d done to her. The self-hatred inside me grew and twisted into an ugly ball of fury. I could be with her right now if I’d handled it right. If I hadn’t been so selfish and scared. She wouldn’t be facing this alone right now.

  “I call . . . I call every damn day. All she has to do is answer.”

  Rush patted me on the back. “She’s scared, too. She’s just scared for different reasons.”

  How could she even consider this? Her heart . . . she was so fragile. “I don’t understand why she would do this. She knows she can’t.”

  Rush sank into the leather chair close to him and let out a weary sigh. “The baby is real to her. It’s inside her. She has a connection with it already. It’s a mother thing. I can’t say that I know how you feel, because the moment I found out Blaire was pregnant, I wanted that baby. It was our baby. It was a part of us. But Blaire was connected to Nate. Even then. I don’t think I felt quite what she felt until they put him in my arms. And . . .” Rush paused and shook his head, then looked directly at me. “I could never choose between Nate and Blaire. Now that I have him, I couldn’t comprehend not having him. Giving him up. And if Harlow feels even a small portion of that already, I get it. I understand completely.”